I suppose this is good news, but after reading this item about how the Weinstein Brothers managed to get the MPAA to change the rating
from "R" to "PG-13" on Julian Schnabel's "Miral," a drama about a young Palestinian
girl trying to survive the Arab-Israeli conflicts, I'm wondering if some kind
of deal was made.

When the MPAA relented a while back and changed its absurd NC-17
rating for "Blue Valentine" to
an R, it looked like the insidious studio self-regulating group might be trying
to reform. But never underestimate the power of studio greed, cowardice, and
hypocrisy when it comes to covering its assets and infantilizing mainstream
commercial movie-making.

The opening Best Picture montage bit in the 83rd Oscars
Broadcast, satirically visiting each Best Picture nominee within an "Inception" framework, almost had me thinking that
they'd pull it off, with James Franco and Anne Hathaway filling the roles of genial,
energetic, funny, hip hosts without the
squirmy mordant edge of Ricky Gervais.

The surprise Director's Guild Award for Tom Hooper and the awards from the Screen Actors Guild -- Best Actor for Colin Firth and Best Ensemble Cast -- pretty
much guarantee an Oscar sweep for "The King's Speech," the lush period biopic
about King George VI, who, with the help of a non-elitist therapist managed
to shake off a debilitating stutter, a toffee-nosed dissolute, Nazi-leaning elder brother,
and a paralyzing father complex, and, apparently, go on to win World War II
singlehandedly.

This year I feel less embarrassed than I normally do after
the Oscar nominations announcements, getting
fewer prognostications wrong
- four - than my usual six or more misfires. On the other hand, those I got
wrong were really the ones that would have taken any genuine acumen to figure
out. So as it stands I got 31 out of 35, around 88%, or a B+ average.

I've been waiting for someone to point to Hollywood
as a convenient scapegoat for the Arizona
shootings.. So far,
so good, however, as nobody has yet resorted to that familiar punching
bag, so popular with both Democrats and Republicans whenever something awful
happens that raises too many tough questions.

Boston PhoenixMovies "R" not usPublished 3/9/2011 by Peter Keough
When the MPAA relented a while back and changed its absurd NC-17 rating for "Blue Valentine" to an R, it looked like the insidious studio...